The Mayerfeld Fellowship is helping me conduct my dissertation research in the Côte d’Ivoire from September – December 2019, which explores the interaction of post-conflict peacebuilding mechanisms after violent conflicts. In transitional justice, there are two main mechanisms that are used for post-conflict reconstruction. These are truth and reconciliation commission as seen in South Africa

This summer I was able to attend the Environmental Systems Research Institute’s (ESRI) geospatial conference in San Diego, California. The week-long conference hosted hundreds of talks, tutorials for new geographical information systems (GIS) tools, and examples of other researchers and organizations who use satellite and GIS in their work. Relating to my own thesis, I

In 2016, the UWCHR’s Rethinking Punishment project supported research in restorative justice by Prof Katherine Beckett and third year law student Martina Kartman. Beckett and Kartman analyzed various restorative justice projects in the country, and drew conclusions that later informed the creation of an innovative restorative justice program designed for Washington State. Collective Justice (formerly

Thanks to the generous award from the 2019 Peter Mack and Jamie Mayerfeld Fund for Human Rights, I spent eight weeks this summer in the Amazonian province of Napo, Ecuador, studying the Indigenous language Kichwa at the Andes and Amazon Field School. Kichwa (or Quechua, outside of Ecuador) is the most widely spoken Indigenous language

The UW Center for Human Rights is proud to present six fellowships to students for their human rights work. The recipients, as pictured above (left to right): Kelsey Gilman co-recipient of the 2019 Peter Mack and Jamie Mayerfeld Award. Kelsey, a former teacher, is interested in educational policy in multicultural societies. She will use the funds to travel

Thanks to the funds from the Mack-Mayerfeld Fellowship, I was able to travel to New Mexico for 5 days in June 2018. The purpose of the trip was two-fold: to visit the Center for Southwest Research at the University of New Mexico to view archival materials, and also to interview elder family members to help

I used the funds from the Benjamin Linder award to return to the town of Nuevo Amanecer, Guatemala to conduct follow-up interviews for my dissertation research and attend the community’s 20th anniversary celebration at the end of July. July 27th marks the anniversary of their return from 15 years of exile in Mexico, where they

From March to September of 2018, I had the privilege of working as a fellow at the Center for Human Rights, made possible by the Jennifer Caldwell Endowed Fund. My work for CHR consisted in constructing an archive for the Northwest Detention Center Resistance (La Resistencia), one of our partner organizations. La Resistencia is a

Within international relations, there is substantial research on how new norms spread and how states decide to join treaties, but very little research on how norms die or decay.  This is an oversight, as norms are not always positive.  We can frame the fight against slavery or shift away from infanticide in terms of the

It is well recognized now that the United States government is deliberately implementing inhumane and discriminatory immigration policies and practices. These policies are arbitrary and unlawful. Moreover, prominent immigrants’ defenders from throughout the country, have been targeted by the Trump Administration for their human rights work in defense of migrants. The Inter-American Commission on Human